[Archived] Ipswich Town vs. BRFC (Off. match preview)

[rovers11]

Its not just random people on here saying ''promotion or bust this season''. That came from the mouth of our erstwhile managing Director to a room full of people at Ewood including the Press.Presumably he knows what its like to stare into the abyss and if someone as clueless as Shelfie can see it then anyone can-oh unless you live in Pune that is.

He didn't say promotion or bust. Financial problems lie ahead quite clearly. A club losing £36m and having a wage bill exceeding income is not good. He spoke of the challenge of maintaining a competitive squad whilst balancing the books and said a transfer embargo was likely if FFP come into full force.

That is very different from saying we will no longer be a club next season if we dont get promoted.

[Rover_Shaun]

It is the cumulative ruin of the last 3 years that have put us on the brink. It is more likely to happen with every dropped point.

PROMOTION IS THE ONLY SALVATION for the club to maintain its current state and facilities.

And yet some are still blind to it. It's not going to magically go away. Staggering!

It is sobering to think that in less than a years time Wolves could be in a stronger position than Rovers.

[rovers11]

So we're not in a financial mess because we broke our transfer record and spent some money? The accounts clearly show we lost 36M last year and didn't go up, you expect the same this year IE no promotion so that will be another 20-25M hole. We'll be some 80M+ in debt at the end of this season they're 3rd full one and you don't consider that a financial catastrophe? What's our income? Whilst there may well be ways round FFP and we're told they're looking into it, again as always with the loons we see no action to reflect those words. It would not take some 6 months for an expert to find a way round it and Venky's to action it, if that was their intent. We won't go up this year and next will be worse as our income will be 8M less and more cut-backs will be made. How can a team challenge those who have just earnt 60M+ when they can't even afford new shelf's?

Many teams come straight down and straight back up. Mackay almost got Cardiff up in his first season losing to Sam in the semi's, Leicester are yet to promoted and Hull did it in one season, so I'm not really seeing the point as clearly you don't always need a season or two to do it.

There's no denying we made a huge loss last year and our net debt increased. However, Venkys pumped around £30m of their own cash into the club in an interest free loan and some was from India state bank which is guaranteed against venkys assets. How is that different from Bolton being in massive debt but owing it to the owner rather than a bank? How is that different to the model clubs like city and Chelsea operate? They spend way above their means but are funded by interest free loans from wealthy owners. We are the same. If owners call in their interest free loan then of course we, and many other clubs, are in big trouble.

I'm not sure that pumping in big money is a major issue for venkys, they are very wealthy. I think the issue is paying big wages to players who dont play. I believe if venkys, or any other owner, wants to continue to pump in big money then there will be ways around FFP.

The teams that come down will most probably have big wage bills and have to cut that down, lose their best players and have to rebuild. That is not easy and takes skilful management. That is why many clubs fail to go straight back up.

Cardiff had been in the division for years and were knocking at the door before they finally got promoted. Hull were down for 2-3 seasons before Bruce transformed them and Leicester were close last season and will probably go up this season.

[SIMON GARNERS 194]

In the past four seasons we have won 11 out of 70 away games (league only). Therefore 15.71%.

Jesus Christ almighty!!

[Plastic Head]

In terms of the finances, clearly the owners will need to put in a massive amount of cash in during the summer to avoid the club ceasing to exist in it's present form.

Even the supporters who do not follow or have no interest in the financial affairs of the club must realise and will admit to this. Any argument to the contrary is claiming that day is night.

A simple statement on the accounts that they intend to continue to fund the business will not be enough to satisfy the insolvent trading laws, the deficit will be just too big and if they simply carry on losing £ at the rate they are and building up debt someone will end up in the nick.

So it is down to the Indians. Cough up (and continue to cough up) or ship out. Either way they will be left with a huge bill for their 3 years of "fun" at our expense.

I think the end of the beginning started with relegation. With promotion now looking unlikely/impossible as things stand I think we are at the beginning of the end.

My call is that the poop will hit the turbine at the end of the season and ownership will change at some point by the end of 2014 one way or another.

Hopefully some sort of football club can be salvaged from the wreckage.

[rovers11]

In terms of the finances, clearly the owners will need to put in a massive amount of cash in during the summer to avoid the club ceasing to exist in it's present form.

Even the supporters who do not follow or have no interest in the financial affairs of the club must realise and will admit to this. Any argument to the contrary is claiming that day is night.

A simple statement on the accounts that they intend to continue to fund the business will not be enough to satisfy the insolvent trading laws, the deficit will be just too big and if they simply carry on losing £ at the rate they are and building up debt someone will end up in the nick.

So it is down to the Indians. Cough up (and continue to cough up) or ship out. Either way they will be left with a huge bill for their 3 years of "fun" at our expense.

I think the end of the beginning started with relegation. With promotion now looking unlikely/impossible as things stand I think we are at the beginning of the end.

My call is that the poop will hit the turbine at the end of the season and ownership will change at some point by the end of 2014 one way or another.

Hopefully some sort of football club can be salvaged from the wreckage.

That sums it up nicely. It's down to the owners to continue to cough up.

It is the cumulative ruin of the last 3 years that have put us on the brink. It is more likely to happen with every dropped point.

PROMOTION IS THE ONLY SALVATION for the club to maintain its current state and facilities.

And yet some are still blind to it. It's not going to magically go away. Staggering!

It is sobering to think that in less than a years time Wolves could be in a stronger position than Rovers.

We've just invested a lot of money into upgrading the facilities so that the academy can get category A staus!

[den]

That sums it up nicely. It's down to the owners to continue to cough up.

And if they decide they aren't prepared to, what happens then?

[Rover_Shaun]

We've just invested a lot of money into upgrading the facilities so that the academy can get category A staus!

Insolvent finances couldn't give a rats arse. The land/property value, of the facility we cannot afford to run and maintain, is all the administrator will care about as he looks to sell it off.

[Leonard Venkhater]

Bad players make mistakes. Even good players do but bad ones make more.

You could play someone else but maybe they are just as bad or worse?

The problem is that players are making mistakes because they are no good and the replacements are probably worse.

So this means the team (and the squad) is not a good one as is unable to do much better than it has so far.

My judgement on what I have seen is that there are 4/5 worse sides but that's about it.

So...we are s***t.....The End!

[Clitherover]

23 points from 18 games theres no Jeckll and Hyde about Rovers

Plus what looks like an uncatchable 13 points from Burnley and its only the first week in December.

Forget Burnley we'll never catch them, I do think we'll beat them at Ewood though.

[Majiball]

Forget Burnley we'll never catch them, I do think we'll beat them at Ewood though.

They won't have Ings when we next play them

[K-Hod]

They won't have Ings when we next play them

I personally think they will. Saying that, if there's one club that loves over spending on young English players it's the Scousers!!

[USABlue]

Bowyer sounds like he's seething, rightly so. We were embarrassing. He has himself to blame for some of it though. I've defended Bowyer in the past but there's no question a lot of what went wrong tonight was down to poor team shape and tactics. Subs were irrelevant.

I do take some issue with his suggestion we were the only team who were going to win the match at half time. Not true at all and grossly unfair to Ipswich.

Granted I was not there but it sounded like we were the better team first half. You were there so I would have to defer to your judgement

[Parsonblue]

We've been facing financial ruin for the past 3 years and it hasn't materialised. When we got relegated everyone was saying we face financial ruin yet we broke our transfer record and spent a huge amount of money. Apparently, last season was promotion or bust yet we are still here and spent a decent amount of money on players in the summer. We are, again, in the same situation where people are saying it's promotion or bust this season. It's not, we will still be here this time next season. We will have to shed some high earners but we'll still be here. The FFP could, of course, be a major issue (if it fully materialises). There are ways round the FFP even if the punishments and demands are as severe as they are claiming.

Regardless of who was manager this season, promotion was always going to be an extremely long shot. You have to build a promotion winning team, al la Cardiff, Leicester, Hull etc.

Try telling the clubs in Leagues One and Two who have had transfer embargoes that there are ways around FFP. It was introduced to prevent owners like ours running up debt and leaving a club in the sort of mess we are in. The club may well be here this time next year but it may well be in a far worse state than it is now. We are now looking at free transfers like Marrow and Judge to improve a very average squad. We have tried that before over many years prior to Jack getting involved and it simply doesn't work. I remember watching Cardiff at Ewood at the start of the 1961-62 season. That was there was season in the top flight until this season. There is absolutely no reason why the Rovers shouldn't have a similar exile from top flight football for a similar period.

[Al]

Up to now I have fully backed the manager but I am now having difficulty reconciling his reluctance to play Cairney in the centre and leaving Rochina on the bench whilst playing the useless D J Campbell. Rochina will be off in January if we don't play him and the team is crying out for his type of player especially when Dunny is not available.

[rovers11]

Insolvent finances couldn't give a rats arse. The land/property value, of the facility we cannot afford to run and maintain, is all the administrator will care about as he looks to sell it off.

An owner can pump is as much money as they want into improving facilities etc through the FFP rules. It's just transfer fees and wages. Why would Venkys invest in that if they were planning to pull the plug a few months later?

I'm no Venkys fan but I don't think it's their plan to put us into admin.

[FGS5635]

The big assumption there is they actually have a plan

[Rover_Shaun]

I'm no Venkys fan but I don't think it's their plan to put us into admin.

Their plan isn't to spunk millions into the club indefinitely either. And what follows when they pull out? It's certainly not riding unicorns to a topless model party I can tell you

[tomphil]

Had to laugh while browsing an Ipswich forum when i noticed them going mad and pouring scorn on the fact flyers for half season tckts had been dropping through some letterboxes. Join the drive for promotion was the pitch lol i wonder just how many teams use that in this league at this time of year.

[West Yorks Rover]

We will obviously never know, but you have to think taylors personal reasons must have been strong, as he would have been chomping at the bit to play after the leeds game

Maybe he was told he was'nt starting and got the hump after being MOTM on Sat, who knows ? he has'nt been used much lately.

Or it could be genuine reason, has'nt his wife had a baby recently ?

[DE.]

Granted I was not there but it sounded like we were the better team first half. You were there so I would have to defer to your judgement

It was pretty equal. Ipswich looked more dangerous the entire game. Towards the end of the first half we put a little pressure on them but Rhodes' classy finish aside we never threatened them at all. Then in the second half we promptly conceded a terrible goal and played the rest of the game like the players had been doing shots of absinthe at half time.

[thenodrog]

Maybe he was told he was'nt starting and got the hump after being MOTM on Sat, who knows ? he has'nt been used much lately.

Or it could be genuine reason, has'nt his wife had a baby recently ?

I don't want to speculate on 'personal reasons' but if she has had a baby and if they are both OK then it really is no excuse.

From leaving Ewood in positive spirit on Saturday to find that the two stand out players against Leeds Dunny and Taylor were not even in the squad was both disappointing and perplexing. In fact very very 'Keanesque' cos anybody who had a good game and especially if they scored usually found themselves dropped next game by Coco. Any positive psychology that may have been intended was always lost on me.

[Majiball]

I don't want to speculate on 'personal reasons' but if she has had a baby and if they are both OK then it really is no excuse.

From leaving Ewood in positive spirit on Saturday to find that the two stand out players against Leeds Dunny and Taylor were not even in the squad was both disappointing and perplexing. In fact very very 'Keanesque' cos anybody who had a good game and especially if they scored usually found themselves dropped next game by Coco. Any positive psychology that may have been intended was always lost on me.

Both neuroscience and behavioral science have clearly shown that once past puberty positivity doesn't promote learning, negativity does.

[Waggy76]

Campbell should not be in the squad never mind playing ...

Very Bizarre !

[Silas]

Both neuroscience and behavioral science have clearly shown that once past puberty positivity doesn't promote learning, negativity does.

Is that true?! Can't tell if your taking @#/? or not.

So, are you saying that science has shown that stick is far more effective than carrot?